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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29015961">A Light in the Darkness</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/PondSong322/pseuds/PondSong322'>PondSong322</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Angst and Feels, Conflicted Ben Solo, Conflicted Kylo Ren, Dark Side vs Light Side (Star Wars), F/M, Family Feels, Feels, Force Dyad (Star Wars), Internal Conflict, The Force</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 13:14:47</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,022</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29015961</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/PondSong322/pseuds/PondSong322</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>I'm dipping my toe into writing Star Wars/Reylo fanfic for the first time with this little piece that's mainly focused on Ben and a couple of crucial moments for him. I feel 1000% positive that Ben Solo felt when Rey was born and that it was a stabilizing and deeply profound experience for him, that these two have have always been connected and the pull to each other has always been there.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kylo Ren &amp; Rey, Leia Organa &amp; Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>16</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Light in the Darkness</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Leia breathes deeply and braces herself. </p><p>Han is off somewhere, again, and it's quiet. Quieter than an apartment containing a typical 10-year-old boy has any right to be.</p><p>But her boy is far from typical. He is exceptional in so many ways. Some frighteningly so.</p><p>With the press of a button, the door in front of her slides open with a soft hiss.</p><p>He sits in a chair facing the window, his back to her. Leia is relieved to sense an aura of peace rolling off of him.</p><p>A few small objects bob silently in the air around him, like a mobile without strings.</p><p>'Ben?'</p><p>'Hi Mom,' the boy replies in a soft, faraway voice. He doesn't turn around.</p><p>'You okay, sweetheart?'</p><p>'Uh huh,’ he murmurs. ‘Can you feel it?' he says as she approaches.</p><p>'Feel what?'</p><p>'The light.’</p><p>Leia kneels down next to her son’s chair. He still doesn’t turn to her, but his profile is gently illuminated by the nighttime cityscape, and Leia is struck by the rapt look on his young face.</p><p>'What do you mean, honey?' she says evenly.</p><p>'It wasn’t there yesterday, but it is now. It called to me. It's been calling all day.'</p><p>‘Like a...a voice?’</p><p>‘No, just a feeling.’ Leia marvels with gratitude at the serenity she senses in her son, and is amazed when he continues quietly, volunteering more of his thoughts than he has in a long time. 'It's so far away, but I feel it like it's here with me. Like it's part of me. It’s so bright,’ he says rapturously. ‘But it doesn’t hurt,’ he adds. ‘I like how it makes me feel.'</p><p>'How’s that?'</p><p>'Quiet. Warm. Like I'm not alone.’</p><p>Leia’s lips press together with a pang of guilt. But Ben's deep, serious eyes are wide and shining with something rare, undefinable. He reaches out and grasps her hand.</p><p>'There...’ he whispers.</p><p>Leia’s breath catches softly as a gentle ripple, like a caress, passes over her. She feels a smile suddenly stretching her face. If only it was always like this.</p><p>'I have to find it,' Ben says.</p><p>'Mm. And how do you plan to do that?'</p><p>His eyes drop and his brow furrows in thought. 'I don't know. Maybe Dad could take me on the Falcon.'</p><p>'But you don't even know where it is.'</p><p>'I know, I don't care! I just <em>have</em> to find it!' Ben sighs and turns his eyes to the sky once more. 'I feel it.'</p><p>Leia reaches out and brushes his messy hair back from his eyes, running her fingers through the soft, ebony strands - an instinctive gesture that’s always had a soothing effect, though she isn't sure if she means to comfort Ben or herself. Perhaps both. He tilts his head to lean into her touch, but he keeps his eyes on the sky.</p><p>'Well, maybe,” she ventures, ‘it’ll find <em>you.’</em></p><p>A cautiously hopeful look takes over his face. He turns to her, earnest eyes meeting hers.</p><p>'You think so?'</p><p>'It's the Force, love. Anything is possible.'</p><p>Her boy gifts her then with something she sees all too rarely from him these days - that crooked Solo smile.</p><p>_______________________________</p><p>The same boy looks out through the eyes of a towering young man swathed in black who hasn't smiled in years. His joyless, isolated existence gives him little reason. He doesn't smile now. He grits his teeth, hunched in pain, angry, lost, tormented, his breathing heavy and labored from the wound torn in his side and the horror lacerating his soul for what he's done.</p><p>
  <em>It is done. It cannot be undone.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Sentimental. Weak. Broken. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Unbalanced.</em>
</p><p>He'd willed his face into an impassive mask beneath his father's last touch on his cheek while the Force screamed and howled inside him.</p><p>The moment felt suspended as Han's body fell away from him. And then pain, compounded with the unexpected anguish mounting rapidly in his mind and heart, had suddenly ripped into his side, bringing him to his knees. Quick as thought, he’d called on the Force to keep himself from following Han into the abyss, to contain the wound that should have killed him. Then he’d looked up and seen –-</p><p>Chewbacca…<em>more betrayal</em>… and –-</p><p>Her. With the Traitor.</p><p>Now biting wind and snow sting his face as he tries to focus on the lightsaber half buried in a drift nearby, flung there when he disarmed the Traitor after he dared to face Kylo Ren. He reaches out to it through the Force, but it doesn't heed his call. <em>Why does it not obey? It was his grandfather's – it belongs to him!</em></p><p>He tries again, harnessing his pain, his mind and fingers straining, demanding that the weapon come to him.</p><p>Suddenly, the saber launches itself from the snow and comes hurtling toward him – and past him.</p><p>He whirls on the spot, following the saber's trajectory – into the hand of the girl.</p><p>The scavenger.</p><p>Rey.</p><p><em>Monster</em>, she’d called him.</p><p>Now he swears he perceives a radiance emanating from her in pulsing waves. There's no mistaking it now – what he sensed in his interrogation of her. Something so achingly familiar – something he's buried in the deepest caverns of his memory - a presence from his dreams, from visions – <em>the pull to the light</em>…</p><p>In his awe and astonishment, he feels something like a smile tug at one corner of his mouth.</p><p><em>It </em> <em> <b>is</b> </em> <em> you... </em></p><p>He's not even sure if he speaks the thought aloud, but he feels the truth of it in the core of his being.</p><p>Her eyes are scared but fierce as she ignites the saber in her hand, bathing her face in blue light. Running on adrenaline and instinct, he ignites his own weapon with a flourish, never taking his eyes from hers.</p><p>He feels her fear, her confusion, her anger, her exhilaration. Or are they his own?</p><p>Is there a difference?</p><p>She sucks in a breath, bares her teeth, and charges towards him.</p><p>The Force winds around them, threading itself between them, and as he raises his crackling crimson blade to meet her attack, he knows in his soul that everything is about to change.</p>
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